Studies have proven that certain colors affect how we react to daily things in life.

This is especially true in business. For decades companies have been using color to make your emotions feel good or sad about something. We see this in all industries–your doctors office, a lawyers office, retail stores, food/grocery stores, movies and even your bedroom. We all buy products off the shelf because they have a certain appeal to your emotions, and hopefully you wanted that product!

Color plays a big part in our lives and it can have a strong influence on your emotions. For example, why do many companies use “blue” for their company logo? According to the chart below, and from research, it depicts TRUST, STRENGTH and someone being DEPENDABLE. And in a doctors office you would see soft blue colors and greens to calm a person so they don’t feel anxious, or worried. Law firms are known to use green for the same reasons.

If your company is thinking about re-painting the interior, look closely at the “Emotion Guide” and ask yourself, how do I want my customers to see us–Strong, Bold, Creative, or Optimistic. You could actually control (to a point that is) an environment when you have customers enter a room. Many companies will paint each room a different color to create the mood/emotion they want their customers to be in when discussing business.

I hope this Emotion Guide helps you in your business. I know I’m still trying to figure out if a striped wall using red with a warm yellow will give the impression of a Bold and Optimistic company. Your thoughts?

7 tips you need to know!

You are the only person responsible for how your career turns out. Excuses are not going to change anything, if you think otherwise, then you are starting in the wrong direction to improve your career. Follow these 7 tips and you could be the next CEO.

1- Choose a career you like. Sounds simple, but many people get into a field or career because of the money or it was their first job. If you like it great, but if you don’t then start thinking of a career change. You cannot move forward if you have a mindset that your job is only a place to collect a paycheck.

2- Knowledge is king. If your field of work requires more education to advance, then be proactive. Do some research to find classes to help you become a better person, or to learn a skill in your field that will help you. For example, if you lack presentation skills and your company does a lot of presentations to new customers, then take classes to learn PowerPoint, or how to conduct meetings, or join Toastmasters to improve your speaking skills.

3- You’re not alone, only if you choose to be. Networking in person is an excellent way to get outside advice and a different perspective. Surrounding yourself with people in similar fields can improve your career advancement by letting others know of your goals and what interests you. Get familiar with people outside your company; make friends with people who work for competitors. You may learn about a new position to advance your career.

4- Make a location change. Sometimes you need to sit back and decide if you are a big city person, or prefer the small town atmosphere. This can hamper you if for some reason you cannot stand the fast pace in a large city. Jobs are not always available in every career in big and small cities, so this is important to decide before you to stick with a career.

5- Moving on. When you got your first job, money might have not been as important until you wanted to buy a new car, or a house, or live in a more expensive neighborhood. If you feel making more money is just as important as the career you choose, then maybe it’s time to move on. That means changing careers, not just location. As you explore new options you will eventually find the career path that meets your needs.

6- Get online in a social way. Another form of networking is through social media. Get connected with LinkedIn and build a network of people in your career, or a career you are seeking to enter. If you have a resume, post it on sites like CareerBuilder, or Monster and The Ladders to name a few. Remember, things just don’t always happen, you need to make it happen, and becoming involved with social media can improve your career opportunities.

7- Have good people skills. You probably hear this all the time that some people just do not work well together. Or they are not good communicators. What about those who just don’t listen closely to what you are saying and ask the same question over again. These are soft skills, or people skills. Improve these skills and you can advance your career no matter the field or location. Examples of skills to help your career would be knowing how to write proper business emails, and how to treat customers. These are just two important skills needed in business today.

It is almost impossible in today’s competitive environment to keep our daily activities organized in one place.Calendars are good to know what to do that day, but you probably have other “reminder” systems in place to coordinate all your daily activities. If your business is large enough, your secretary or assistant might be that organizer for you. But not always is that person at your fingertips.

Organizing Business Activities

I came across a few APPS that could help you organize your activities all in one place, making life just a little simpler. I am sure there are other apps being developed during this writing, maybe even something completely different will become available making all these apps obsolete. So for now, lets look at these 5 apps.

Recently Google launched an app called Google Keep. Like many of Google’s products, the “Keep” will sync your notes with Siri (iPhone users) and Google Drive. It will color-code them for easy retrieval, construct to-do lists, compile photos, and archive notes for later viewing. If you have used Evernote, then you will most likely want to try Keep. Google is constantly improving this app to become the choice for people on the go.

Jumpchart is slightly different. For example if you are redesigning your website, Jumpchart helps you plan your website layout, view the most recent content revisions, and a lot more, all in real time. Although this app is free, the more advanced features are at a cost up to $50, but worth it if that’s what you need to help keep things organized.

For those who are concerned about accounting and billing might want to look at Harvest app. This is a time tracking app program that will help you see where your staff is spending their hours, based on time spent on each task. If you use QuickBooks, you can export these reports into that program to keep real-time reports for billable hours. Another feature of Harvest, you can create invoices with your company logo and offer clients to pay invoices online.

Here is something that many active social media people will find useful. Hootsuite. This app helps you manage all your social networks, such as Linkedin, Twitter, Google+, Foursquare, MySpace, WordPress, Facebook and Mixi accounts. It’s a great way to track your brand mentions and analyze your social traffic.

What to do next?

If you are truly a busy entrepreneur who just cannot remember to take your iPhone charger with you, or pick up your cleaning, or need to locate a restaurant for a client lunch meeting, then look no further than WunWun. This is not free. It’s a concierge service to make sure all your needs are met and on-time. WunWun is a 24/7 service that cost $2.50 for every 5 minutes of service, or you can choose $20 flat fee for deliveries.

I am still trying to find an app that just lets me be alone for a while. Seems our lives are so packed with things to do we just cannot tear ourselves away from not knowing what is happening in the world, or what our competitors are doing next. If I find an app that lets our devices all fall asleep at the same time, I’ll pass that along to you. For now, keep organizing.

If you want to learn how to make your business more productive, then call George Carson at Carson Marketing, Inc. 949-477-9400

Just like Microsoft, Google has deep pockets. But these deep pockets alone cannot make people want your service. It wasn’t long ago when Google introduced the “WAVE” which after a few months washed away. And remember when Microsoft had its search engine that just didn’t cut it. Then they got smart and re-structured their search to be the new “Bing”. With smarter marketing, publicity and knowing how to position themselves (rather than wanting to be something for everyone), Bing is slowly creeping into the Google territory taking away market share.
It doesn’t mean that Google+ will fail. What needs to be done is better street marketing. Google is good at keeping a pulse on their market, but are those who have been Facebook fans willing to change, or add another social network? Time will tell. And this time Google needs to watch closely before dumping another project, or becoming bored with it.

A recent article in WebPro News gives readers a chance to better understand how the writer, Chris Crum views the 10 obstacles Google needs to overcome in order to be a powerful social network. Many of his points are valid.

So ask yourself, do you have extra time to now add Google+ to your other networks like Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, and the many others that exist. Especially now that MySpace is trying to make a comeback. Is this market getting overcrowded–maybe. But as we have seen in the last 20 months, new and different ways to communicate are developing. Who knows, in the next 6 months all of these social networks may be old news and something more unique will connect us in an easier manner.

Learn more about how to connect using social media for your business. Contact George Carson at 949-477-9400, or visit Carson Marketing, Inc.

To help stay ahead of the competition you need to keep in touch with new methods of getting your message out.

That may sound very basic, but it is amazing how many companies think they are keeping on top of what’s happening.

You can read daily trade journals, daily newspapers and read a lot of blog sites. These are all good ways to keep current, but sometimes we just don’t have the luxury of time. So how do you stay in touch? One way is to subscribe to or become a member of organizations that can help you keep current of trends. One such group is the AMA (American Marketing Association).

This organization has been providing a lot of worthy information to help companies of all sizes. No, this isn’t an advertisiment for them. I just felt it would be good for companies to know of this organization, because it can be a valuable source.

Marketing is the key to any successful campaign or publicity program.

If you want to get into the core of marketing, check out other marketing sources, such as Guerrilla Marketing pro, Jay Levinson. His keen vision on marketing can keep your path to success in line.

When your company needs that extra input, these and many other sources are available. Research the web and go to your library to find out more information on successful marketing techniques.

If you still need a good marketing and publicity campaign, but just do not have the time, or the people power to implement a program, consider contacting a professional company to get the message out.

When I wrote the last couple of blogs about creating a press kit and getting publicity, I realized most people might still be confused as what to do, because they do not know the words used in PR. To help you better understand this lingo, I searched the web and came across a site that has a glossary of terms relating to publicity. Check them out at the link below, the PR Academy.

Then I came across another article for press kits. This guy goes into more detail than my blog, so I felt it was a good idea to provide you the article in Entrepreneur magazine.

His deeper explanation will help those seeking more knowledge to make the press kit more complete.

After you do your research and realize that your company can use some positive pr, it is a good idea to have a plan. Yes, just like a business plan, or an advertsing plan, the pr "campaign" should be well designed prior to sending that article or press release. Even if you think you’re only sending this one article or release, that’s not enough. You wouldn’t place one ad in one publication and say, "that should do it for this year, next year we will do that again".

Be prepared to have a series of releases to submit to the media. You can only become noticed when you make yourself noticed.